Do comments increase SERPS?

[Ryan Ward]

How do comments affect a blog post? (other than the obvious aspects of being viewed and read more) Do rankings for a post increase with comments? Just curious 'cause this post is out of control! BTW webmaster Ijust noticed what you meant when you said look at the right side of the page! That's cool

[ericbramlett]

I'm not sure, but I would think that the comments in themselves wouldn't increase the SERPs, but the viral effect of that post will definitely help it out. I wouldn't be surprised if people were already linking to it.

[webmaster]

Yes! but not in the direct way you are referring to. What it does #1 is get people talking, if people are talking, people are linking and links increase serps.

Also, comments = unique content, which increase the # of potential keywords that page can rank for.

[webmaster]

More hooks in the water as they say

[BrandonSternfield]

Too many hooks and the fishies swim away.

Also, the more comments you have, the more links you have leaving your site. So any link you have in your post that you did to add rank (i.e. linking an article on your website, that you paraphrased or analyzed on your blog) would get less link love.

[webmaster]

Comments do not generally contain links though

[BrandonSternfield]

The link back to the person's blog

Here is a screen shot of your blog's comments, the one about Tom.



Excuse the bad paint job, but I'm bored. I love when you have to wait for other companies to do their jobs, and get back to you. <3 local MLS board.

Oh, and it says Link, then has a heart with an arrow through it, like cupid, this Link Love.

[webmaster]

Ah IC what you mean, those are internal links, not external so really comment in comment out, the pagerank, authority etc of the domain as a whole, and the balance of the blogs should remain in tact.

[BrandonSternfield]

Good point. Totally didn't think they were all internal lol

Eh, it gave me an excuse to photoshop a screen shot. It was worth it.